interiors for travellers

Denver: Clyfford Still Museum (USA)

In 2007 Allied Works Architecture was selected to design a new museum to house the works of american Abstract Expressionist artist Clyfford Still. Located in a precinct containing works by Gio Ponti, Michael Graves and Daniel Libeskind, the Clyfford Still Museum stands proudly alongside them.

It is a strong sophisticated work in concrete construction, beautifully detailed and crafted, including a delicate cast in-situ concrete lattice ceiling screen that filters the natural light into the gallery spaces. The project is described by Allied Works Architecture on their website with the following text:

‘The 28,000 square foot museum mediates this setting with two distinct acts of architecture. The first prepares the site by creating a dense grove of deciduous trees—a place of refuge from the intense light of central Colorado. The second act of architecture looks to the earth. The Museum is conceived as a solid, a continuous form that is opened up by natural light. Walls of textured concrete form the primary building envelope, interior walls and structural system. The entrance, deeply recessed beneath the cantilevered walls, holds the visitor to the earth. The lower level houses the education, archive and storage spaces. In the upper level galleries, the visitor moves through a series of nine distinct volumes where they encounter the work of Clyfford Still. Overhead, an open lattice of concrete unites the body of the building and offers illumination and connection to the atmosphere of the city. The galleries respond to the evolving character of Still’s art, changing scale and proportion, while varying the intensity of light.’